Andrew Lloyd Webber will take a break from his television search to find a Nancy for the musical Oliver to cheer on his star filly Dar Re Mi in the Tattersalls Musidora Stakes at York.

And a win for Lord Lloyd Webber’s filly on Wednesday would be a fitting tribute to the great Shirley Heights, who landed one of the most memorable of Dante Stakes wins at this meeting exactly 30 years ago.

There will certainly be a few echoes of the old star in the air when current Epsom Oaks favourite Dar Re Mi puts her Classic claims on the line as she is a direct descendant of the Dante and Derby winner.

Owned by Lord Halifax, whose son was later to become chairman of the York Race Committee, Shirley Heights was reared a few miles from the Knavesmire at the Garrowby Stud, where a commemorative plaque still shines outside his old box.

It was in 1978 that Shirley Heights took on the then Derby favourite Leonardo Da Vinci, the 2000 Guineas runner-up Remainder Man and several other top class colts, including the subsequent St Leger winner Julio Mariner in the Dante.

Ridden by Greville Starkey, Shirley Heights won easing down from Julio Mariner and Sexton Blake, a win which proved a prelude to Classic glory at Epsom the following month.

At the end of his three-year-old career, Shirley Heights was retired to the Sandringham Stud in Norfolk and became a successful sire with an influence for stamina.

One of his first matings was with Sea Hawk mare Sunbittern and the result was the filly High Hawk, who, at three, won the Ribblesdale Stakes at Royal Ascot, the Park Hill Stakes at Doncaster and the Prix Royallieu at Longchamp as well as finishing second in the Irish Oaks.

High Hawk went to the paddocks in her turn and a mating with the highly influential Sadler’s Wells produced In The Wings, who is the paternal grand-sire of Dar Re Mi.

Dar Re Mi, who is trained at Newmarket by John Gosden, will be having only the third race of her life in the Tattersalls Musidora, but she showed immense promise when winning a Sandown maiden by seven lengths last month.

The seven furlongs that day was completely inadequate and the step up to 10 furlongs will prove ideal, just as it was for her great-great-grandsire 30 years ago.